INDIANA CRIME 2013

We are pleased to announce the new anthology Indiana Crime. Indiana Crime will be an annual anthology.

We want your stories! Open for submissions on: 03/01/2012. Submissions will remain open till filled. Target date for publication and release:05/01//2013.

Our aim is to showcase Indiana authors. We want crime fiction that takes place in Indiana and prefer stories written by Hoosiers or those who have a connection to the Hoosier state. Crime stories with horror and/or science fiction elements are especially welcome.

The Basics

What we want_

We are looking for stories that are 1500-5000 words in length. Although the emphasis is on short stories, we will also consider select pieces of poetry and flash fiction (up to 1500 words) for this anthology if they reach out and grab us by the throat.

So what are we looking for? We want pulp. We want grit. We want heroes and villains, the famous and the infamous, the notorious and glorious. We want raw characters with all their quirks, habits, flaws and vices in full bloom. Give us stories filled with outlaws, gangsters, crooks, thieves, private eyes, marshals, detectives, sheriffs, detectives and amateur sleuths. Throw those characters headlong into bootlegging, hi-jacks, drug running, train robberies, bank heists, corporate crime, extortion, murder, fakes and forgeries. The tale can be about crooks or the cops who catch them. The era can be present day, the 1800’s or any time in between. You decide. The tale can have elements of other genres, like horror, sci-fi, western, urban fantasy or steampunk. If your story is a good one, and involves a crime in Indiana, we want to see it. Think Seth Harwood, Ken Bruen, The Late Robert B. Parker, Elmore and Peter Leonard, J. Lee Butts, Victor Gischler, Sean Doolittle, Jeff Somers, Marcus Sakey, Duane Swierczynski, Jim Thompson, Don Winslow, Richard Stark, Vachss or Hammett and Chandler or John Connolly. Above all, give us a story that makes us want to keep reading.

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CONTENT

We do not censor and, in fact, welcome controversial themes.

Art

We are also seeking an artist to provide theme-related, original front and back cover and interior art. Finished art work should be high-resolution, print quality digital image of the work. The work can be line art, pen-and-ink, digital graphics or any other suitable medium. Artwork must be original. Artist agrees to grant the right to use the image on the cover of Indiana Crimeand for any related marketing purposes for the duration of the book’s availability. Back cover art should include spacefor text.

Please give a brief cover letter in the body of your E-mail and include your name, full contact info including postal address, phone # and E-mail address, a 2 – 3 sentence ‘teaser’ of your story including approximate word count and a brief bio that tells us a little about you, your publishing credits, awards and honors. Don’t have any? No problem! All writers are welcome here, so don’t sweat it.

Payment The top two stories, one favorite selected by each editor, will receive payment of $25. Payment will be through PayPal. Additionally, all authors selected will have their bio and photograph published in the anthology with their story. The selected artist will be paid $10 for the featured work and will also be given a cover art credit and bio space in the anthology. Payment will be made approxiametly 61 days after publication.

We will announce some acceptances as we go, but will hold our announcement of our selected “favorites” until the end. We hope to respond to submissions within 4-6 weeks, but will hang on to some stories longer if they are being considered. Be patient. A slow response may mean you’ve made it through the “first cut” and we are holding your story for further consideration. We are writers too, so we know how tough it can be. We want to give everyone an equal chance and fair consideration. Time permitting, we will comment on submissions. We may request some edits if a story is under serious consideration. We will work with you.

Murphy Edwards: Murphy Edwards has appeared in over fifty professional magazines and journals including, Dimensions Magazine, The East Side Edition, Black October, Horizons, MidAtlantic Monthly, Modern Drummer, The Nor’Easter, Walking Bones, Escaping Elsewhere, Trail of Indiscretion, Hardboiled Magazine, Barbaric Yawp, Samsara, The Magazine of Suffering, The Nocturnal Lyric, Night Chills, Big Pulp Magazine and in the anthologies Dead Bait (Severed Press), Assassin’s Canon (Utility Fog Press), Abaculus II (Leucrota Press), Night Terrors (Blood Bound Books), Unspeakable (Blood Bound Books), Bloody Carnival (Pill Hill Press), Dead Bait II (Severed Press) and Indiana Horror 2011 (Indiana Horror Writer’s Association). His short story, “Mister Checkers”, was chosen to be among the best in science fiction, fantasy and horror of 2009 for the Leucrota Press Anthology, Abaculus III. Edwards is also a 2011 recipient of The Midwest Writers Workshop Writers Retreat Fellowship Award for Fiction. In addition to the United States, Edward’s work has been published in Ireland, Australia, South Africa, and the U.K. He currently resides in Indiana and on the web at http://murphyedwards.wordpress.com

James Ward Kirk: He is a member of the Horror Writers Association. James Ward Kirk is the publisher and editor of the Indiana Horror and Indiana Science Fiction annual anthologies (Amazon & Smashwords.) His novel “The Butterfly Killer” is in the publication process with Wild Child Publishing. His most recent publications include short stories in Dark Gothic Resurrected magazine and the anthology Shadow of the Unknown. He lives in Indianapolis with Monica, his wife of 20 years, and his Chihuahua Lucy (the meanest dog ever).

JAMES WARD KIRK
I am the publisher and editor of the annual anthologies Indiana Horror, Indiana Crime and Indiana Science Fiction. My novel "The Butterfly Killer" is available on Amazon. I have multiple short story publications.